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A young friend who competes at high level, recently had to stop riding because of asthma like symtoms(short breath, difficulty breathing) he went to hospital and doctors said his heart is enlarged to a man of the age of 60 (3x his actual age) anyone ever heard of a similar experience or know of it? does it sound more genetic or possibly from over training?any input would be appreciatedthank you

Finally got my login to work.Your friend should ask to see a doc who has interest in sports medicine. High level endurance athletes naturally will develop a degree of cardiomyopathy. The question is whether this is normal or pathological.As far as pathological a number of causes depending on what type of cardiomyopathy: Genetic, viral, hyperthyroidism, steroids.Again the challenge here is a doc who doesn't work with athletes may have trouble discerning pathological from normal in this situation. The degree and type of cardiomyopathy also defines the degree of danger in regards to arrythmias.

Definitely have your friend check with a cardiologist that works with athletes. When I changed primary physicians years ago she freaked when listening to my heart and immediately did an EKG and sent me packing for a stress test. My heart takes a powerful beat then stops and restarts, its been doing this for years. The cardiologist was wondering why I showed up with running shorts and shoes. I told him if he wanted to get my heart rate up it was not going to happen by walking. He stopped the stress test midway and told me there was nothing wrong with my heart.

Juan what you are having is almost certainly a premature ventricular contraction. It is a normal finding and not dangerous. essentially instead of the heart beat starting at the SA node and passing into the ventricle quickly through the ventricular conduction system via the AV node, it initiates in the muscle of the ventricle and passes like a slow wave through the ventricles. So instead of a nice coordinated beat of the ventricle where it all squeezes at once, you get a contraction that moves like a wave starting in one part of the ventricle and slowly passing to the others. Often there is a brief pause after as the ventricle has not reset when the next normal pulse comes through.Absolutely normal especially in us athletes who have a resting bradycardia and not at all concerning as your cardiologist said. That is assuming I am correct about what is happening.

Julio: Aortic or thoracic? A ruptured aneurysm is no joke, rarely do you survive. smoking and hypertension most common cause. From an exercise perspective I would certainly avoid heavy weight lifting that sort of thing. Certainly annual rechecks will be important. Often over 6cm it gets repaired or bypassed. Have you seen vascular surgery?

drchull wrote:Julio: Aortic or thoracic? A ruptured aneurysm is no joke, rarely do you survive. smoking and hypertension most common cause. From an exercise perspective I would certainly avoid heavy weight lifting that sort of thing. Certainly annual rechecks will be important. Often over 6cm it gets repaired or bypassed. Have you seen vascular surgery?

Thanks.

Aortic I thought. Now I'm wondering if I remembered correctly. Because the research I'm doing is kind of scary. Specialist Dr didn't seem THAT concerned. In fact he said to come back in 2 yrs and I suggested 1 yr. Don't smoke and my hypertension has always been under control. I'm seeing my GP in a couple of weeks so I'll ask some more questions.

There's sometimes a buggy.How many drivers does a buggy have?

One.

So let's just say I'm drivin' this buggy...and if you fix your attitude you can ride along with me.

I started having some similar symptoms as above last month, went to the ER and they also did a nuclear stress test and Echo. Echo came back with Bicuspid Aortic Valve. I also have some enlargement of the walls, but not any more than a trained athletes heart, which should come back to normal with rest. I have gotten a cardiologist for more in-depth monitoring.